Guest Post: Lord and Master by Kait Jagger

Lord and Master Trilogy

Maybe you see what her boss, the Marchioness of Lionsbridge, sees: the best PA she’s ever had, a 26-year-old fixer who makes problems disappear with four quiet words—‘Leave it with me.’ Or you see a remote, untouchable Ice Princess who the 500-year-old Arborage Estate’s heir presumptive longs to crush under his heel. Possibly, if you’re looking carefully, you see Luna as her friends see her: the quiet one, touched by childhood tragedy, who laughs at their jokes and has their backs no matter what.

But ultimately it takes charismatic, devastatingly attractive Swedish entrepreneur Stefan Lundgren, third in line to inherit the estate, to glimpse the intelligent, fiercely independent woman under Luna’s calm exterior. And what he sees he wants, this woman in ten thousand who is meant for him, body writhing beneath his in the dark of night, her inner self slowly revealing itself to him. Or so he believes.

But Luna has built an entire life predicated on concealment, on maintaining control and hiding dark things in drawers. It will take the entirety of the Lord and Master trilogy, from the manicured gardens of Arborage, to the wilds of Shetland, to the streets of Stockholm, for her to step out of the shadows in the face of a new threat to Arborage.

You think you know Luna? You don’t.

The Lord and Master trilogy:Lord and MasterHer Master’s ServantThe Marchioness

Author Guest Post

How to Make Your Characters Believable

A few years ago when I was getting ready to publish the first book in my Lord and Master Trilogy, I asked a fellow romance author for editorial comments. I remember one of her criticisms was that my hero, Swedish business guru Stefan Lundgren, ‘kept disappearing for weeks at a time. WTF?’ Her point, I think, was that he couldn’t be all that into my heroine if he was doing so much travelling for work.

But in real life people have work commitments. And families. And, you know, stuff going on in their lives that maybe doesn’t involve their girlfriend. It was extremely important to me that Stefan and my heroine, Luna Gregory, come across as real people, with real problems and responsibilities—and if that meant Stefan occasionally ‘disappearing’ on work assignments, well, so be it. But how else could I make my characters believable?

Write what you know – I know, I know, it’s a horrible cliché. But so much of the most entertaining fiction, from Scott Turow’s legal whodunits to the adventures of Patricia Cornwell’s medical examiner Kay Scarpetta, is based on real life experiences. It’s a sign of the massive inferiority complex most personal assistants have, however, that I hesitated to make Luna a PA like me. I think it was the right call, though, not just because I had all the fun of sneaking some of my own secretarial misadventures and pet peeves into her storyline, but because Luna’s career is a vehicle for demonstrating her intense loyalty, doggedness, and slight OCD tendencies!

Nobody’s perfect – There’s a real temptation, particularly in the romance genre, to endow your lead characters with exclusively admirable characteristics. Beautiful, smart, sexy women and strong, confident, hot men—that’s what the genre’s all about, right? But perfect people are hard to warm to. So I made sure to give Luna some flaws: insecurities and irrational fears, a touch of stubbornness, and an aversion to sharing her feelings that often leaves her isolated even from the people who love her. Likewise, Stefan is a quintessential driven businessman who, at least at the start of the Trilogy, often lets his private life take a backseat to his personal ambitions.

Repeat after me – Dialogue is also key to breathing life into your characters. Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m not advocating peppering verbal exchanges with all the ‘ums’ and ‘you knows’ that litter real life conversations, but I admit to giving Luna a few of my own verbal ticks. When the going gets tough, Luna doesn’t hesitate to cut loose with a few fucks and wankers!

For what it’s worth, by the end of the Trilogy my hero Stefan isn’t travelling so much for work anymore. As he says to Luna, ‘Now everything I want is here.’ Which is…well, I think that’s pretty believable too!

About Kait Jagger

I live on a farm in Lancashire, England with my husband, four children, one dog and one cat. Like Luna Gregory, the lead character of the Lord and Master trilogy, I make my living as a personal assistant.